The Cotton Malone Series 7-Book Bundle

by Steve Berry

  “I am not ignorant,” Pau said in nearly a whisper. “You came because you knew Tang wanted that lamp.”

  Outside of his office, that fact was unknown. Concern now rifled through him. This old man was far better informed than he’d ever assumed. But something else occurred to him. “The woman stole the lamp for Tang?”

  Pau shook his head. “She wanted it for herself.”

  “So you allowed her to take it?”

  “I thought it better than Minister Tang acquiring it. I have anticipated that he might come and, actually, was at a loss as to what to do. This woman solved the problem.”

  His mind reeled, assessing the changed situation. Pau Wen stared at him with eyes that had surely borne witness to many things. Ni had come thinking a surprise visit to an elderly, ex-Chinese national would provide an easy opportunity. Obviously, the surprise was not Pau’s.

  “You and Minister Tang are the two leading contenders for the presidency and premiership,” Pau said. “The current holder of that office is old, his time draws to a close. Tang or Ni. Everyone will have to choose their side.”

  He wanted to know, “Which side are you on?”

  “The only one that matters, Minister. China’s.”

  FIVE

  COPENHAGEN

  Malone followed the Chinese courier, his suspicions confirmed. She knew nothing about what she was sent to retrieve, only to take what he offered. Hell, she’d even flirted with him. He wondered how much she was being paid for this dangerous errand, and was also concerned about how much Cassiopeia’s captor knew. The voice on the laptop had made a point to taunt him about his government experience—yet they’d sent an uninformed amateur.

  He kept the courier in sight as she eased her way through the crowd. The route she was taking would lead them out a secondary gate in Tivoli’s northern boundary. He watched as she passed through the exit, crossed the boulevard beyond, and reentered the Strøget.

  He stayed a block behind her as she continued her stroll.

  They passed several secondhand-book stores, the owners all competitors and friends, and countless outdoor tables for the many eateries, ending at Højbro Plads. She veered right at the Café Norden, which anchored the square’s east edge, and headed toward the steeple of Nikolaj, an old church that now served as a public exhibition hall. She turned along a side street that led away from Nikolaj, toward Magasin du Nord, Scandinavia’s most exclusive department store.

  People paraded in the streets, enjoying a collective joviality.

  Fifty yards away, cars and buses whizzed back and forth where the Strøget ended.

  She turned again.

  Away from the department store and the traffic, back toward the canal and the charred ruins of the Museum of Greco-Roman Culture, which still had not been rebuilt from a fire that had destroyed it last year. Cassiopeia Vitt had appeared that night and saved his hide.

  Now it was his turn to return the favor.

  Fewer people loitered here.

  Many of the 18th- and 19th-century structures, their façades long restored, had once been brothels frequented by Copenhagen’s sailors. Apartments, favored by artists and young professionals, dominated today.

  The woman disappeared around another corner.

  He trotted to where she’d turned, but a trash receptacle blocked the way. He peered around the plastic container and spied a narrow alley closed in by walls of crumbling bricks.

  The woman approached a man. He was short, thin, and anxious. She stopped and handed over the envelope. The man ripped it open, then yelled something in Chinese. Malone did not have to hear what was said to understand. Clearly, he knew what was expected, and it damn well wasn’t a book.

  He slapped her face.

  She was thrown back and struggled to regain both her balance and composure. A hand went to her wounded cheek.

  The man reached beneath his jacket.

  A gun appeared.

  Malone was way ahead of him, already finding his Beretta and calling out, “Hey.”

  The man whirled, saw both Malone and the gun and immediately grabbed the woman, jamming the barrel of his weapon into her neck.

  “Toss the gun in that trash bucket,” the man yelled in English.

  He was deciding whether to risk it, but the terrified look on the woman’s face told him to comply.

  He dropped the gun over the container’s edge, which thumped around, signaling that little else lay inside.

  “Stay put,” the man said as he backed down the street with his hostage.

  He could not allow the trail to end here. This was his only route to Cassiopeia. The man and his captive kept easing toward where the alley connected to another busy street. A constant stirring of people passed back and forth at the intersection.

  He stood, fifty feet away, and watched.

  Then the man released his grip on the woman and, together, they ran away.

  Ni assessed Pau Wen, realizing that he’d fallen directly into the trap this clever man had set.

  “And what is best for China?”

  “Do you know the tale of the crafty fox caught by a hungry tiger?” Pau asked.

  He decided to indulge Pau and shook his head.

  “The fox protested, saying, ‘You dare not eat me because I am superior to all other animals, and if you eat me you will anger the gods. If you don’t believe me, just follow and see what happens.’ The tiger followed the fox into the woods and all the animals ran away at the first sight of them. The awed tiger, not realizing that he was the cause of their alarm, let the fox go.” Pau went silent for a moment. “Which are you, Minister, the crafty fox or the unwitting tiger?”

  “Seems one is a fool, the other a manipulator.”

  “Unfortunately, there are no other contenders for control of China,” Pau said. “You and Minister Tang have done a masterful job of eliminating all challengers.”

  “So do you say I am the fool or the manipulator?”

  “That is not for me to decide.”

  “I assure you,” Ni said, “I am no fool. There is corruption throughout our People’s Republic. My duty is to rid us of that disease.”

  Which was no small task in a nation where 1% of the population owned 40% of the wealth, much of it built from corruption. City mayors, provincial officials, high-ranking Party members—he’d arrested them all. Bribery, embezzlement, misappropriation, moral decadence, privilege seeking, smuggling, squandering, and outright theft were rampant.

  Pau nodded. “The system Mao created was littered with corruption from its inception. How could it not be? When a government is accountable only from the top down, dishonesty becomes insidious.”

  “Is that why you fled?”

  “No, Minister, I left because I came to detest all that had been done. So many people slaughtered. So much oppression and suffering. China, then and today, is a failure. There is no other way to view it. We are home to sixteen of the world’s twenty most polluted cities, the world leader in sulfur dioxide emissions. Acid rain is destroying our land. We pollute the water with no regard for consequences. We destroy culture, history, our self-respect, with no regard. Local officials are rewarded only for more economic output, not public initiatives. The system itself assures its own destruction.”

  Ni cautioned himself that those observations could all be a deception. So he decided to utilize some misdirection of his own. “Why did you allow that woman to steal the lamp?”

  Pau appraised him with a glare that made him uncomfortable, akin to his own father’s gaze that he’d once respected.

  “That is a question to which you should already know the answer.”

  Malone tipped the trash bin over, found his gun, then bolted down the alley.

  He should have known.

  The courier was no victim. Just an accomplice who’d messed up. He came to the alley’s end and rounded the corner.

  His two adversaries were a hundred feet ahead, running toward bustling Holmens Kanal, its lanes jammed with sp
eeding vehicles navigating toward Copenhagen’s busiest square.

  He saw the two dart left, vanishing around a corner.

  He stuffed the gun away and mixed force with polite phrases to bump his way past the crowd.

  He came to a traffic-lighted intersection. The Danish Royal Theater stood across the street. To his right, he caught sight of Nyhavn, busy with people enjoying themselves at colorful cafés that stretched the new harbor’s length. His two targets were making their way down a crowded sidewalk, paralleling traffic and a busy bicycle lane, heading toward the Hotel d’Angleterre.

  A Volvo eased to the curb just before the hotel’s entrance.

  The man and woman crossed the bicycle lane and headed straight for the car’s open rear door.

  Two pops, like balloons bursting, and the man was thrown back, his body dropping to the pavement.

  Another pop and the woman fell beside him.

  Crimson rivulets poured from each body.

  Fear spread, a ripple that sent a panic through the afternoon crowd. Three people on bicycles collided with one another, trying to avoid the bodies.

  The car sped away.

  Tinted windows shielded the occupants as it roared past, then whipped left in a sharp turn. He tried to spot the license plate, but the Volvo disappeared around Kongens Nytorv.

  He rushed forward, knelt down, and checked pulses.

  Both were dead.

  The bicyclists appeared injured.

  He stood and yelled in Danish, “Somebody call the police.”

  He ran a hand through his hair and heaved a sigh.

  The trail to Cassiopeia had just vanished.

  He eased himself away from the throng of gawkers, close to the outside tables and windows for the Hotel d’Angleterre’s restaurant. People with shocked faces stood and stared. Dead bodies on the sidewalk were not commonplace in Denmark.

  Distant sirens signaled that help was coming.

  Which meant he needed to go.

  “Mr. Malone,” a voice said, close to his left ear.

  He started to turn.

  “No. Face ahead.”

  The distinctive feel of a gun barrel nestled close to his spine told him to take the man’s advice.

  “I need you to walk with me.”

  “And if I don’t?” he asked.

  “You do not find Cassiopeia Vitt.”

  SIX

  SHAANXI PROVINCE, CHINA

  10:00 PM

  Karl Tang stared out across the vast enclosed space. The helicopter ride north, from Chongqing, across the Qin Mountains, had taken nearly two hours. He’d flown from Beijing not only to personally supervise the execution of Jin Zhao but also to deal with two other matters, both of equal importance, the first one here in Shaanxi, China’s cultural cradle. An archaeologist in the Ministry of Science had once told him that if you sank a shovel anywhere in this region, something of China’s 6,000-year-old history would be unearthed.

  Before him was the perfect example.

  In 1974 peasants digging a well uncovered a vast complex of underground vaults that, he’d been told, would eventually yield 8,000 life-sized terra-cotta soldiers, 130 chariots, and 670 horses, all arrayed in a tightly knit battle formation—a silent army, facing east, each figure forged and erected more than 2,200 years ago. They guarded a complex of underground palaces, designed specifically for the dead, all centered on the imperial tomb of Qin Shi, the man who ended five centuries of disunity and strife, eventually taking for himself the exalted title Shi Huang.

  First Emperor.

  Where that initial well had been dug now stood the Museum of Qin Dynasty Terra-cotta Warriors and Horses, its centerpiece the exhibition hall spanning more than two hundred meters before him, topped by an impressive glass-paneled arch. Earthen balks divided the excavated scene into eleven latitudinal rows, each paved with ancient bricks. Wooden roofs, once supported by stout timbers and crossbeams, had long ago disappeared. But to bar moisture and preserve the warrior figures beneath, the builders had wisely sheathed the area with woven matting and a layer of clay.

  Qin Shi’s eternal army had survived.

  Tang stared at the sea of warriors.

  Each wore a coarse tunic, belt, puttees, and thonged, square-toed sandals. Eight basic faces had been identified, but no two were exactly alike. Some had tightly closed lips and forward-staring eyes, revealing a character of steadiness and fortitude. Others displayed vigor and confidence. Still others evoked a sense of thoughtfulness, suggesting the wisdom of a veteran. Amazingly, the still poses, repeated innumerable times in a given number of defined postures, actually generated a sense of motion.

  Tang had visited before and walked among the archers, soldiers, and horse-drawn chariots, smelling the rich Shaanxi earth, imagining the rhythmic beat of marching feet.

  He felt empowered here.

  Qin Shi himself had walked this hallowed ground. For 250 years, ending in 221 BCE, seven ruling kingdoms—Qi, Chi, Yar, Zhao, Han, Wei, and Qin—had fought for dominance. Qin Shi ended that conflict, conquering his neighbors and establishing an empire with all authority centered in himself. Eventually, the land itself acquired his name. A perversion of the way Qin would come to be pronounced by foreigners.

  Chin.

  China.

  Tang found it hard not to be impressed by such grand accomplishments, and though Qin Shi had lived long ago, the man’s impact still resonated. He was the first to divide the land into prefectures, each composed of smaller units he named counties. He abolished the feudal system and eliminated aristocratic warlords. Weights, measures, and currencies became standardized. A uniform code of laws was enacted. He built roads, a wall to protect the northern border, and cities. Even more critical, the various and confusing local scripts were replaced with one written alphabet.

  But the First Emperor was not perfect.

  He enforced severe laws, imposed heavy taxes, and requisitioned people by the thousands for both military and construction services. Millions died under his reign. To begin an enterprise is not easy, but to keep hold of success is even more difficult. Qin Shi’s descendants failed to heed the First Emperor’s lesson, allowing peasant revolts to ferment into widespread rebellion. Within three years of the founder’s death, the empire crumbled.

  A new dynasty succeeded.

  The Han.

  Whose descendants continued to dominate even today.

  Tang was a Han, from Hunan province, another hot, humid place in the south, home to revolutionary thinkers, Mao Zedong its most prominent. He’d attended Hunan’s Institute of Technology, then transferred to Beijing’s School of Geology. After graduating, he’d worked as a technician and political instructor on the Geomechanics Survey Team, then served as head engineer and chief of the political section for the Central Geological Bureau. That’s when the Party had first noticed him and he was assigned positions in Gansu province and the Tibet Autonomous Region, gaining a reputation as both a scientist and administrator. Eventually, he returned to Beijing and rose from assistant to director of the general office of the Central Committee. Three years later he was elevated to the Central Committee itself. Now he was first vice premier of the Party, first vice president of the republic, one step away from the tip of the political triangle.

  “Minister Tang.”

  He turned at the sound of his name.

  The museum’s curator approached. He could tell from the man’s clipped stride and polite expression that something was amiss.

  Tang stood on the railed walk that encircled Pit 1, fifteen meters above the terra-cotta figures. The 16,000-square-meter exhibit hall was closed for the night, but the overhead lighting in the hangar-like space had been left on, per his earlier instruction.

  “I was told you had arrived,” the curator said. Eyeglasses dangled like a pendant from a chain around the man’s neck.

  “Before going to Pit 3, I wanted a few moments here,” Tang said. “The sight of these warriors never disappoints me.”

&
nbsp; Outside, six more halls stood in the darkness, along with a theater, book counters, and a menagerie of shops and stalls that tomorrow would hawk souvenirs to just a few of the two million who flocked here every year to see what many called the eighth wonder of the world.

  He spat at such a designation.

  As far as he was concerned, this was the only wonder of the world.

  “We must speak, Minister.”

  The curator was a conservative intellectual, part of a Zhuang minority, which meant he would never rise any higher. The entire Qin Shi site came under Tang’s Ministry of Science, so the curator clearly understood where his allegiance lay.

  “I’m having trouble containing things,” the curator told him.

  He waited for more explanation.

  “The discovery was made two days ago. I called you immediately. I ordered no one to speak of it, but I’m afraid that instruction was not taken seriously. There is … talk among the archaeologists. Several know that we broke through to another chamber.”

  He did not want to hear that.

  “I realize you wanted the discovery kept secret. But it’s proven difficult.”

  This was not the place, so he laid a reassuring hand on the man’s shoulder and said, “Take me to Pit 3.”

  They left the building and walked across a darkened plaza toward another broad structure lit from the inside.

  Pit 3 had been discovered 20 meters north of Pit 1 and 120 meters east of Pit 2. The smallest of the three excavations, U-shaped, and barely five hundred square meters made up its space. Only sixty-eight terra-cotta figures and one chariot drawn by four horses had been found there, none in battle formation.

  Then they’d realized.

  The dress, gestures, and formation of the warriors suggested Pit 3 to be the underground army’s command center, reserved for generals and other senior officials. The warriors here had been found arrayed with their backs to the wall, wielding bronze poles with no blades, a unique weapon utilized only by imperial guards of honor. In addition, its location, in the far northwest corner, ensured that it was well protected by the armies of the other two pits. In life Qin Shi had led a million armored soldiers, a thousand chariots, and ten thousand horses to conquer and “gloat over the world.” In death, he’d clearly intended something similar.